Know When to Walk Away
I’ve been coming to and through Las Vegas for many years. My sister Barbara and her family moved here in 1978 and have never looked back. My mother moved there to support my sister in 1980 and spent the rest of her life there. That meant that I had lots of reasons since those days to pass through Las Vegas. For almost 30 years, Las Vegas was a logical jumping off point for my motorcycle trips every spring to the Southwest. From Las Vegas you can head east to Arizona, north to Utah, west to California or due north through the Great Basin of Nevada. I’ve stayed all over the city, but have probably stayed at the Green Valley Ranch the most since it’s a perfect launching point. Needless to say, Las Vegas is a particularly convenient flight hub with flights going to and from just about anywhere.
Las Vegas, which means “the meadows” in Spanish was initially a watering spot on the The Old Spanish Trail between Santa Fe and Los Angeles back in the early Nineteenth Century. But other than a few ranches with wells, not much went on in that valley until 1905, when it got founded as a proper settlement due to being a convenient half-way stop on the railroad line that linked Los Angeles and Salt Lake City. Like what happened at countless otherwise remote spots around the country, the railroad brought new residents and people looking for new opportunities and desert lands that could benefit from piped in water. The nearby Colorado River that passes by on its way to the Gulf of California provided the ultimate impetus for the development of the city. It was the building of the Boulder Dam (renamed Hoover Dam in 1947) in 1931-1936 that brought men, hotels, casinos and all the distractions roughnecks might want to Las Vegas. That set a pattern whereby gambling and prostitution became the mainstay businesses of this desert oasis. Starting in 1941, through the war years with transiting servicemen, and then into the 50’s with the discovery of Las Vegas by the Mafia, Las Vegas began to settle in to its gambling and adult fun reputation. It was Bugsy Siegel and Moe Green who are credited with the biggest growth phase, turning Las Vegas from a desert waystation into a destination resort. Bugsy Siegel’s place was the Flamingo Hotel, which was eventually bought by Hilton. I actually had the opportunity to stay in the Bugsy Suite (thanks to my Btother-in-law Dave, who worked there) before it was torn down to build a bunch of new condos on the east side of the resort complex. When Howard Hughes discovered Las Vegas in 1966 he helped transform it from a mob driven casino town into a much broader family entertainment complex.
My first exposure to Las Vegas came in 1962 when I was traveling Westward from Wisconsin to San Diego with my Uncle John and Aunt Kitty. They were a childless couple and they had taken charge of me at my mother‘s request to deliver me to California to meet and spend some time with my father. Their cross-country trip had been financed by a significant win at the Caliente Racetrack in Tijuana so it’s not hard to believe that when we got to Las Vegas on our Westward journey, they were pretty anxious to hit the casinos. They were not used to having an eight year old to deal with so their solution was to leave me alone in the motel room with the TV and some snacks, while they went out and gambled to their heart’s content. So from a very young age, I was aware of what Las Vegas was all about so when I started visiting my mother and sister there in 1980, I got in the habit of staying at one of the casinos and taking full advantage of the gaming tables. I have told the stories of learning my gambling lessons in my early days of working in the locker room in Maine and then again in my freshman dorm at Cornell, so by 1980 I was very familiar with major games of chance like poker and blackjack, but I was in no way hooked on gambling. Nevertheless, every time I went to Las Vegas, I would invariably spend a number of hours mostly at the Blackjack table.
I have been taught how to count cards on several occasions, but I don’t seem to have the right mind for it because it requires more concentration than I like to bring to a leisure pastime. I typically bet between $25 and $100 per hand in blackjack and generally keep my winnings or losing within $5000. The one time I did better than that was when I played blackjack with my friend Russ, who was a serious card counter (he claims to have financed his college education at the Blackjack table). On that occasion I won $25,000 by following Russ’s lead as he counted cards.
As the years have gone by, I’ve become less and less interested in spending too much time at the tables. Quite frankly, I find it boring. Today was a perfect example. We arrived in Las Vegas about an hour early for our dinner reservation with my sister Barbara and her family. It so happened that the restaurant she chose was right next to a big casino. My daughter, Carolyn, and Kim like to play the slot machines so they suggested we go into the casino. If I’m going to go into casino, I’m gonna play blackjack. So while they went to the slot machines, I found the blackjack table. I sat down and put $300 down and proceeded to play $25 chips per hand. In about 20 minutes, I was flirting with the total loss of the $300 and I bought another $200 in chips. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about playing blackjack or really any gambling in almost any way, other than perhaps poker, it’s that the only way to win is to walk away from the table when you are winning. It’s a very simple strategy, but one which I find works very well. Well, let’s put it this way, if you have any chance of winning, it’s to catch the cycle when you’re ahead and walk away at that time. Sometimes you get there, sometimes you don’t. Today, when I got the added $200, on a whim (something you should not bring to the gaming tables), I bet $100 on the next hand rather than $25. It just so happened that I got my first and only blackjack of the day on that hand and it paid out $150. Suddenly, I was on the road to recovery. I kept playing $50 hands and I kept winning and as my time was running out, I won one last hand and ended up with $550. Even though I had another 10 minutes to play, my experience told me to walk away at that moment and be happy to recoup my investment and come out $50 ahead. Actually, I came out $25 ahead because I gave $25 to the dealer since at one point I had gotten rather irritated with her when she tried to take away my bet on a winning hand rather than pay out on that hand. I felt I had to square my karma with a nice tip.
That is the only advice I have for gambling and Las Vegas….know when to walk away.